The adventures of Gary and Carolyn living aboard and continuously cruising the uk canals and rivers on narrowboat Inca

Thursday, 25 May 2017

Bandit country (again)

We pulled pins from our mooring at Parbold at 06.25, yes I know it was early but a fantastic day of weather was forecast so not being one’s to waste the day we thought we would make the most of it. The plan today is to try and get to bridge 9 on The Leeds and Liverpool canal by 14.00 which is the time that the swing bridge is operated by Canal and River Trust staff . They then drive ahead and also operate swingbridge number 6 it’s then a 1 hour cruise in to Litherland which it seems is a safe place to moor. We have been told that it is bandit country and not safe to stop anywhere all the way in and if you are going to moor before bridge 9 the safest place is back at bridge 10.

We stopped off for water on the way at the rufford junction which is where we will be heading when we come out of Liverpool as we have booked The Ribble link to take us up onto The Lancaster canal.

An early morning miserable Angler . I don’t know what more us boaters can do to make them happy . I slow down to tick over and keep in the middle of the canal . Yet as we pass there is no eye contact or a hello or anything. Carolyn still always makes a point of saying hello to every single one of them , it’s funny sometimes to see their response. Come on Anglers give us a smile and a wave.

After a good cruise and plenty of swing bridges but no locks we arrived at Swing bridge 9 . We arrived at 13.30 so had half an hour to spare which was pretty good going.

As CRT staff operate the bridge we are told not to stop and keep going and they would be at bridge 6 to meet us . This is a very busy road and one of the reasons they operate it for you is in case an emergency vehicle wants to pass over .

This is one place I’ve always looked forward to passing on our boat . It is Aintree racecourse and this is the Canal turn fence. Unfortunately the view of the course from the canal is hopeless and I was a bit disappointed ,anyway at least we saw it.

After passing through bridge 6 it was a 1 hour cruise in to Litherland and the safe moorings . We were surprised to see Sid and his mate Paul the CRT guys standing on most of the bridges on our way in and asking if we were OK . It turned out that a couple of days before a boat had been stoned from one of the bridges by the local Scroates and as we were the only boat going in they were concerned for our safety.

We eventually arrived at Litherland after a most enjoyable nine and a half hour cruise .We were locked in the compound which is also the CRT services and their work yard and office, There are cameras and a fence that surround the area. After mooring Sid came down to check we were OK and said he would be back tomorrow , a great service from CRT we thought. We have a day off tomorrow so we will do a big shop in Tesco which is the building in the back ground and get ready for our trip in to Liverpool.